Hi!
Is it possible to install openSUSE 13.1 on a server with only 500 MB of RAM? I will not need any graphical GUI (at most LXDE). My question is: Does it check for minimum memory requirements and is it not going to install at all unless RAM >= 1GB?
Thanks!
On 2013-11-23 23:56, gianluca4 wrote:
>
> Hi!
>
> Is it possible to install openSUSE 13.1 on a server with only 500 MB of
> RAM? I will not need any graphical GUI (at most LXDE).
Probably. I run 12.3 on such a machine.
> My question is:
> Does it check for minimum memory requirements and is it not going to
> install at all unless RAM >= 1GB?
No, no checking. Maybe YaST makes a warning, I don’t remember. At worst,
create the swap partition in advance and mount it. If you can not create
the partition with openSUSE installer, use the rescue image in the same
media, or use something else, like puppy.
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 12.3 x86_64 “Dartmouth” at Telcontar)
I know for sure that it does install and run with 768MB if you select the KDE Desktop Environment. 
I think the supported minimum is 512MB, but I guess you should do the installation in text mode then. I had the (13.1 Beta) graphical installer hang during package installation with that amount of memory (without adding swap before though).
But even a GUI with LXDE should run fine with 512MB, I even used KDE4 with only 512MB until 3 years ago.
Thanks. The linux Mint website indicates that you need at least 384 MB to run Mint 15 with XFCE. So I suspected opensuse 13.1 should run on 500 MB with something lightweight.
Do you by any chance know whether with puppy you can compile your own code? I have an old 30 nodes dual XEON CPUs with 500 MB per node that I want to use to run gromacs simulations (just single CPU tasks, no MPI) and I will need to be able to compile it and run it on the nodes. It requires cmake >= 2.7 and other stuff. openSUSE makes life easier because everything you need is there, but puppy is small and lightweight.
Thanks!
When you install you are given the choice alternate Desktop environments of Minimal X and and Minimal Server(aka Text)
Although I haven’t looked up their requirements, I’m sure they should fit your need and require even less than LXDE and XFCE.
TSU
A late version of cmake is certainly available in the standard packages.
Good luck, other dependendencies than the common cmake might be more a problem.
TSU
On 2013-11-24 00:36, wolfi323 wrote:
> I think the supported minimum is 512MB, but I guess you should do the
> installation in text mode then. I had the (13.1 Beta) graphical
> installer hang during package installation with that amount of memory
> (without adding swap before though).
If you have swap, it would even work with much less, as long as the
kernel can initialize and start swap. From that point on, it starts
swapping and you have ample memory. Slow, but ample.
I have an old computer with just 32 MiB RAM, and about .75 GiB swap. I
have seen it with 500 MB or more in swap. Yes, slow… but it finished
the job.
(7.3 YOU had a big memory hole. Every package it read from the update
repo meant a fair size more of ram used. So it read a package at a time,
perhaps a minute thinking for each…)
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 12.3 x86_64 “Dartmouth” at Telcontar)
Yes, I know.
I installed some 10.x version on an old (even then already) machine with 80MiB.
The installer complained that there’s not enough memory, I should add some swap.
After I did, it installed fine (in text mode of course).
On 2013-11-24 01:16, gianluca4 wrote:
>
> robin_listas;2601059 Wrote:
> Thanks. The linux Mint website indicates that you need at least 384 MB
> to run Mint 15 with XFCE. So I suspected opensuse 13.1 should run on 500
> MB with something lightweight.
Look, this is 12.3 on 500 MiB ram (P-IV)
> top - 01:36:56 up 9 days, 6:07, 4 users, load average: 0,03, 0,04, 0,05
> Tasks: 124 total, 2 running, 122 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
> %Cpu(s): 2,0 us, 0,7 sy, 0,0 ni, 97,3 id, 0,0 wa, 0,0 hi, 0,0 si, 0,0 st
> KiB Mem: 500628 total, 455524 used, 45104 free, 21028 buffers
> KiB Swap: 6143996 total, 16740 used, 6127256 free, 369952 cached
At the moment, it is running jobs in text mode, but I also use it with
LXDE to watch movies, and it doesn’t even break sweat. About half the
ram in use.
> Do you by any chance know whether with puppy you can compile your own
> code?
I suppose so, but I don’t use it that much to know. I use it for
emergencies and some maintenance on old computers or while visiting
somebody and I don’t have my own laptop.
And now I might use the openSUSE XFCE image instead.
> I have an old 30 nodes dual XEON CPUs with 500 MB per node that I
> want to use to run gromacs simulations (just single CPU tasks, no MPI)
Mmmm… nice.
> and I will need to be able to compile it and run it on the nodes. It
> requires cmake >= 2.7 and other stuff. openSUSE makes life easier
> because everything you need is there, but puppy is small and
> lightweight.
You don’t really need to run graphics mode for that.
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 12.3 x86_64 “Dartmouth” at Telcontar)
By any chance, do you have the output of free? That would tell me how much is in real use and how much is buffers/cache. I definitely do not want the system to swap a lot, otherwise it’s not worth it. If the OS leaves me with ~100 MB besides the system tasks, I will be fine, since gromacs does not need a lot of memory.
On 2013-11-24 03:46, gianluca4 wrote:
> By any chance, do you have the output of free?
Sure.
> AmonLanc:~ # free -h
> total used free shared buffers cached
> Mem: 488M 476M 12M 0B 2,7M 410M
> -/+ buffers/cache: 63M 425M
> Swap: 5,9G 16M 5,8G
> AmonLanc:~ #
> That would tell me how
> much is in real use and how much is buffers/cache.
The head of “top” also says it 
> I definitely do not
> want the system to swap a lot, otherwise it’s not worth it. If the OS
> leaves me with ~100 MB besides the system tasks, I will be fine, since
> gromacs does not need a lot of memory.
Having things in swap is not that important as the i/o traffic in swap.
I mean, having to retrieve or push things from/to swap.
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 12.3 x86_64 “Dartmouth” at Telcontar)
Thanks! This is great information. Only 63 MB are effectively used.
> I definitely do not
> want the system to swap a lot, otherwise it’s not worth it. If the OS
> leaves me with ~100 MB besides the system tasks, I will be fine, since
> gromacs does not need a lot of memory.
Having things in swap is not that important as the i/o traffic in swap.
I mean, having to retrieve or push things from/to swap.
I totally agree with you. That’s what I meant with “swap a lot”, I meant to say swap frequently, lots of I/O as you correctly say. But I’m not worried about that too much now after seeing the information you sent me.
BTW, I remember that some distros might not allow you to install a system if not enough RAM is present. In 2001, I tried to install Redhat on a 486 with 1 MB of RAM and it would not work because it required at least 2 MB.
On 2013-11-24 05:16, gianluca4 wrote:
>
> robin_listas;2601152 Wrote:
> Thanks! This is great information. Only 63 MB are effectively used.
Remember, though, that I run it in text mode; usually as download
server: my internet is slow, which means that to download a dvd it takes
a day or two. I prefer having that laptop powered full time than the
powerful desktop machine.
But using a light desktop, such as LXDE, works fine, too. No swapping.
> BTW, I remember that some distros might not allow you to install a
> system if not enough RAM is present. In 2001, I tried to install Redhat
> on a 486 with 1 MB of RAM and it would not work because it required at
> least 2 MB.
I suppose there /is/ a minimum
I installed a machine with 5 MB. I used SuSE 5.3. The CPU was a 386SX20
with external coprocesor.
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 12.3 x86_64 “Dartmouth” at Telcontar)